Posted on 23 December 2009 by Brian Hart

The Nook (from Barnes & Noble) has faced stiff competition since it entered the e-reader market where Amazon’s Kindle and Kindle 2 have dominated. One of the big criticisms of the Android-powered Nook has been it’s sluggishness, but now Barnes & Noble has rolled out the 1.1 firmware update to address the Nook’s performance issues and has added some additional promotional features.

Along with being a better, faster Nook, the 1.1 firmware update has enabled the Nook to receive local promotions for Nook owners to download and read free content while in a Barnes & Noble store. The promotions will also include freebies from in-house Starbucks and possibly entire books for reading while within the store. The promotional features are a great way for B&N to differentiate the Nook from other e-readers out there. If you are a Nook owner and have received the firmware update, do you notice a performance difference? Please comment!